The Hazel Green Herald

The Workman's Wife

THREE wide, white roads met at a little piece of short, dry lawn, where stood a finger-post, pointing in three opposite directions.

Two of the roads led to the small town and smaller village just visible across the meadows, and the third up a long, dusty white hill to the downs beyond.

A dreary, dismal prospect, with its stiff rows of poplars against the sky-line, and the stunted willows fringing the slow-flowing stream. But here and there a bush of white hawthorn shone out pure and beautiful, and patches of yellow marigolds made gay the low-lying meadowland. Spring showed herself in the faint green of the bushes, the pale blue of the sky, and the rich song of the thrush.

She laid her flower-laden hands on the poor bare pasture and made all beautiful, like the smile of a mother in a dismal home.

Up the steep hill a group of workmen toiled, their white tool-baskets hung on their backs, their brown figures all in harmony with the scene.

They moved with the slow slouching gait born of long toil, their heads bent, their eyes dull and listless with the weight of many years of hard work and drudgery.

One of them, a younger man, paused at the finger-post, and bidding a brief 'good night' to his comrades, chose a small path running close by the line and through the brown fields, ploughed and harrowed in readiness for the seed. A few solitary crows stalked up and down among the ridges, looking for the grain they had come too early to find.

One corner of the field was still yellow with the useless mustard, and a fire had been made of the rubbish and was dimly burning, sending a cloud of pale blue transparent smoke across the landscape.

Everything stood out clean-cut in the clear spring atmosphere, and the heart of the man was as the heart of a little child, drinking in insensibly the beauty of life and of nature.

His rough garments were stained with the shales he had been working among all day. His thick corduroy trousers, strapped at the knee, creaked as he walked; his heavy, mud-caked boots, trod the young grass under foot. His throat was bare and brown, and in his rough, hairy hands, with their split and blackened nails, he held his tool-bag and tea-can, as well as some fragments of dry wood he had picked up on his way.

But God made man in His own image before the days of fustian and corduroy, and the reflection of Heaven lay in his blue eyes and on his broad brow. The splendor of life and the goodness of the Creator came to him as naturally as the song to the bird, and the thankfulness in his heart as he strode on was as acceptable as the power of a saint.

A little figure crossed the meadow on the opposite side of the line, and his gaze fixed upon it. A dainty figure, despite the old brown gown and lilac apron; a girl with the sun in her hair and eyes, and who carried the heart of the workman in her little hand. Over his face stole a tenderness too deep for words, and his heavy walk quickened as he watched his wife seat herself on a fence and shade her eyes with her hands.

Watching for him, he thought, 'God bless her!' and he waved his tool-bag awkwardly enough.

But the shaded eyes were looking in another direction, watching a graceful figure advancing with swinging gait. Tibby glanced down coquettishly at her trim feet swinging from the stile and then up at the young squire, and her husband smiled at her pretty attitude.

Then the youth paused, and the two fell into conversation, passionate and pleading on his part, timid, yet yielding on hers. She laid her hand on his arm and looked up at him with tearful, loving eyes, and the grip of the devil's hand took hold of the husband's heart.

With white set face and clenched fists, he moved slowly towards the two figures, still unconscious of his proximity. Then the girl laid her head back against her companion's breast, and their lips met as meet the lips of lovers.

Reluctantly they parted. The gentleman was soon out of sight, while the village wife sprang down from the fence, and as she did so she caught sight of her husband on the opposite side of the line.

Afraid of discovery, ashamed, blushing rosy red, with quick woman's deceit she ran lightly down the bank to meet him, as if she had been watching for him, and him alone. As she did so the misery of his face changed to one of horror, and the dull roar of the approaching express fell on his ear.

Quick as thought he flung himself across the line, and meeting his wife, hurled her roughly back on to the bank in safety. What passed between the souls of husband and wife, as for one moment their eyes met? Was it confession on one side, forgiveness on the other? God knows. But the train passed by, crushing out the life of the workman as a moment before a woman had crushed out his joy.

And to the ever swelling crowd of saints and martyrs was added yet another soul that day.